Is it a bad habit to reveal most of the information still at the beginning of the story?
This is a habit I have with my stories, and I think it's a bad practice. The story I'm writing isn't of the suspense genre, it's a mix of fantasy and realistic fiction, but a bit of "I wonder what/who/how would that be?", and showing the answers later on is never a bad thing (if well implemented).
I think I'm a plotter, and maybe a bit of a pantser too. I write the core of the story, almost always already knowing the ending, and then I write excerpts describing every idea I have as soon as they come to my mind. I only start writing the story at full when I've established enough ideas, so I can let the events happen and the characters act for themselves.
However, in my case, this process leaves all details exposed, most of the time right at the beginning (but not in an info-dump). Little to no important information remains to reveal later. In my opinion, a story with no surprises and no suspense and no mystery, that just reveals everything the reader wants to know right away, is just plain boring.
But I also don't know if it's just the way I structure it, or if it's simply just bad writing. Should I cover what is uncovered? Should I leave the revelation of some information to later chapters? Should I trick the characters?
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/27059. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
2 answers
You are accessing this answer with a direct link, so it's being shown above all other answers regardless of its score. You can return to the normal view.
Good stories are not created by withholding information from the reader. They are created by constructing a satisfactory story arc, by creating the desire to know what happens next. The desire to know what happens next is not created by withholding information. It is created by engagement with the story. Information creates engagement. Withholding information restricts engagement. Of course, the information has to be relevant and interesting or it will not be engaging, but the only thing you should withhold is what happens next.
0 comment threads
The main problem with "revealing too much" is info-dumps. Boring the reader early on. If you can reveal a lot without boring the reader, that's great!
The opposite of what you do - dribbling bits of exposition and making the reader tear down the image they built and rebuild it with the new info repeatedly - is a far worse problem.
If you feel the rest of the story is getting dry, just migrate some pieces into later sections in the editing phase. It's quite easy when you have all the pieces already laid out, to find where something would fit better - say, transformed from "tell" into "show" as we encounter it live in the story, or your cabbagehead has the good opportunity to ask his questions. Regardless - if you indeed, can provide all the exposition in the beginning of the book without ever boring the reader, I can only congratulate the talent.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/27064. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
0 comment threads
0 comment threads